The present invention relates to a dental handpiece, in particular, a dental handpiece of a motor driven type which can be sterilized conveniently.
Tools and instruments used for dental treatment are sterilized after use for each patient in order to prevent cross infection between patients. Such sterilization is usually performed with, for example, boiling water, high-pressure steam (autoclaving or chemi-claving), EOG (ethylene oxide gas), ultraviolet, or alcohol. Among them, sterilization of dental handpieces is mainly carried out with high-pressure steam or EOG.
Sterilization of motor-driven dental handpieces by the above-mentioned way often causes deterioration of brushes in the motor due to the steam intrusion. Further, since such sterilization is carried out at an elevated temperature, sensors in brushless motors tend to be damaged by heat. Therefore, it is desirable to take the motor away from the handpiece before sterilization of the handpiece.
However, the motor is integrally and undetachably built in the handpiece driving section. Thus, it is hard to remove only the motor from the handpiece, nor is it practical to do this after use for each patient.
Accordingly, with a handpiece which can be divided into a handpiece body and a driving section, only the handpiece body is conventionally subjected to the sterilization such as autoclaving, while the driving section accommodating the motor is merely wiped with alcohol.
This driving section accommodates a variety of fluid passages, and is exposed to direct contact with users such as dentists. Therefore, it is desirable to sterilize the driving section sufficiently by autoclaving and the like method.